Additional American Records of the Ruff. — In ‘The Auk’ for October, 
1905, pp. 410, 411, Mr. Ruthven Deane published a list of 16 American 
specimens of the Ruff ( Pavoncella pugnax). To this list at least six addi- 
tions should be made, one for South America, two for Barbados, two for 
Rhode Island, and one for Massachusetts. Five of these records have 
already been published and for the privilege of recording the sixth bird, 
a specimen from Massachusetts, I am indebted to Mr. Deane and Mr. 
John E. Thayer. This specimen, a female, shot by Alfred Dabney on 
Nantucket, late in July, 1901, was mounted, and is now in the Thayer col- 
lection at Lancaster, Mass. 
The data for the early records of the Ruff leave much to be desired in 
the way of completeness. Giraud in 1844 mentioned the fact that “the 
Ruff, Wheatear, Skylark, and other foreign species have been found on 
Long Island,” but apparently thought that they were birds which had 
escaped from captivity (Birds of Long Island, p. 309). , The first positive 
record of the species in America is probably that for Barbados, noted by 
Schomburgk in 1848, instead of that for New Brunswick, published by 
Boardman in 1862, as stated by Mr. Deane, but in neither case is the exact 
date of capture known. The first record for North America is apparently 
the Long Island note published by Lawrence in 1852 in the ‘Annals’ of 
the Lyceum of Natural History. Prof. Baird in referring to the species 
in 1858 said: “The ruff has been so frequently killed on Long Island as to 
entitle it to a place among descriptions of North American birds, although 
it can not be said to belong to our fauna” (Pac. R. R. Reports, IX, p. 737). 
But the only bird in the list which represents those ‘so frequently killed 
on Long Island’ prior to 1858, is the Lawrence specimen now in the Ameri- 
can Museum of Natural History. 
The southernmost record for the species is indefinite both as to date and 
locality. It was based on ‘an abnormally colored specimen’ collected by 
H. Munzberg in ‘Spanish Guiana’ and submitted for examination with 
other specimens to Pelzeln, by H. E. Hodek, a taxidermist of Vienna. 
Pelzeln’s notes on Hodek’s specimens appeared in ‘The Ibis’ for 1875, 
but how much earlier the bird was killed is not known. In the Catalogue 
of Birds in the British Museum, Vol. XXIV, p. 506, Sharpe gives the locality 
as ‘ Dutch Guiana,’ but Pelzeln, who uses the term ‘ Spanish Guiana,’ states 
that it probably refers to the territory between the Upper Rio Negro and 
the Orinoco or the adjacent part of New Granada. 
Careful search will probably bring to light several other records, especi- 
ally of some of the birds taken on Long Island. For convenience of com- 
parison the data for the six additions to Mr. Deane’s list are appended in 
the same form as that adopted in his table: 
Sex 
Locality 
Date 
Collection 
References 
?ad. 
Barbados, W. I. 
Before 1848 
British Museum 
Schomburgk, Hist. 
Barbadoes, 1848. 
Feilden, Ibis, 1889, p. 
494. 
— 
Spanish Guiana 
“ 1875 
H. E. Hodek, 
Vienna 
Pelzeln, Ibis, 1875, p. 
322. 
cfad. 
Graeme Hall Swamp, 
Barbados, W. I. 
1878 
British Museum 
Feilden, Ibis, 1889, 
p. 495. 
? 
Sakonnet Point, R.I. 
July 30, 1900 
Hathaway, Notes R. 
I. Orn., I, p. 20,1900. 
9 
Nantucket, Mass. 
July, 1901 
John E. Thayer 
Palmer, Auk, XXIII, 
p. 98, 1906. 
$im. 
Point Judith, R. I. 
Aug. 31, 1903. 
Le Roy King, 
Newport, R. I. 
King, Auk, XXI, p. 
85, 1904. 
Aafc, asm, Jaa., 1000, P 7* - 77. 
T. S. Palmer, Washington, D. C. 
